Speranza
Speranza Michel Tournier, Vendredi ou Les Limbres du Pacifique, otherwise known as Crusoe’s Island, or, on a bad day, the Island of Despair, is an island that was made famous in the early eighteenth century for being the extended home of a certain Robinson Crusoe Daniel Defoe, The Life and Strange Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Of York, Mariner, who was shipwrecked there on 30th September, 1659. Geography Speranza is a small island some twenty leagues off the coast of South America near the mouth of the Orinoco, Venezuela, and not midway between the island of Juan Fernandez and the coast of Chile as has been suggested by French geographers. The interior is hilly, divided by a fertile valley. There are several fine beaches and coves, and the mouth of a small river makes a good port in the north-east. The remains of the three camps that Robinson Crusoe built can be visited; one near the mouth of the river, another on a rocky platform towards the north-west, from which a good view of that part of the island can be had, and a third camp in the interior valley. Here Crusoe planted barley, corn and rice which now supplement the indigenous species of the island: thorny fir-trees, iron-trees, tobacco, aloes, sugar-cane, melons, grapes, citrus and cocoa-trees. There are no wild beasts, except a kind of wildcat (now interbred with a domestic species brought by Crusoe) and goats. Many birds live on this island: parrots, hawks, penguins, rock-pigeons, etc. There are also turtles and a few hares. To the south is Friday’s Beach, where Crusoe first saw a human footprint, and a little farther to the west stands a pole Crusoe set up to mark his way. A wooden post that served him as a calendar, with the words “I came on shore here on the 30th of Sept. 1659” can still be seen near his first camp. Towards the south-west, some two leagues away, are a couple of small islands of no major interest. Human bones, the remains of an cannibalistic feast, can be found on Friday’s Beach. There are two main seasons twice a year; rainy from mid-February to mid-April and from mid-August to mid-October; dry from mid-April to mid-August and from mid-October to mid-February. Travellers should bear this in mind an avoid the rainy season. After Robinson Crusoe Robinson Crusoe left the island on the 19th December 1686 when he was picked up by an English ship that had been taken over by mutineers. With the help of Crusoe, the captain was able to take back the ship and maroon the criminals on the island. When Crusoe returned in 1694 Daniel Defoe, The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, however, he discovered that the English mutineers had been making trouble, although when the island fell under attack by cannibals the various parties on the island were forced to work together under truce to meet the threat. Crusoe took various steps to consolidate leadership on the island and assure the civility of the inhabitants, including leaving a quantity of needed supplies, setting up a sort of rule of law under an honour system and ensuring cohabiting couples are married. He also left additional residents with necessary skills. It is uncertain whether this colony still exists, or was destroyed. One of the world’s leading authorities on Speranza, Mr. Gabriel Betteredge Wilke Collins, The Moonstone, house-steward, has unfortunately not written a book on the subject. References Category:Pages Category:Places